BET Networks has returned to the area to take over the city, musically. People noticed signage around town in the form of banners, billboards on buses, bus benches, buildings, print, radio and television announcements and the old fashion postcards, flyers from the marketing and promotions street team members.

This is the fourth year for the BET in Los Angeles. It has grown from its humble beginning entertaining 10,000 in the parking lots across from L.A. LIVE. The crowd has swelled to ten times the original attendance.

The 2016 BET Experience commandeered the entire property of L.A. LIVE including the Staples Center, Los Angeles Convention Center, Microsoft Square and NOVO.

Last week while hobnobbing with writers at the Bay Area Book Festival gala atop the Memorial Stadium, which overlooked the UC Berkeley campus and the sparkling bay, I couldn’t help but give into nostalgia. Exactly 30 years ago I, a premed, graduated from that campus down below with a degree in biochemistry. But I didn’t become a doctor. I picked up the pen, dropped the test tube, and through some years of struggling, became a journalist and writer instead.

Yet if I didn’t learn how to write at Cal, it was certainly here that my literary life really began. A refugee boy from Vietnam at age 11, I barely spoke a word of English. I lived in a crowded apartment full of refugees where Mission Street ended and the working class of Daly City began. It wasn’t until I was a junior at Lowell High School in San Francisco, when a few of my Vietnamese friends were applying to Cal, that I first heard of the school. And I thought that maybe I, too, should apply.

ORLANDO — Victor is recovering in an Orlando hospital room after being shot twice during the Pulse massacre last Saturday night.

The 24-year-old Salvadoran is being consoled by three friends at his bedside, but as an undocumented man with no relatives nearby and no idea when his injuries will allow him to return to work, he’s worried about how he’s going to pay for the hospital bills—and what will happen to him if he can’t.

Victor, whose name has been changed to protect his identity, is one of two undocumented immigrants who were shot and survived during the nightclub attack. The other, a 33-year-old Mexican named Javier, is recovering in the hospital and reportedly in stable condition despite taking a bullet to the abdomen.

Los Angeles-Don’t ever allow anyone to tell you that they are bored, there is nothing to do. This past weekend, June 18-19, 2016, there were three culturally enriching events that were vying for my time.

Due to time constraints, I stopped by Leimert Park Village, near Crenshaw and Vernon for the 7th Annual Juneteenth Heritage Festival. The festival was held on Saturday, June 18, and Sunday, June 19, 2016. This year’s theme was “Faith, Family and Global Future.”

Recent news reports stated that Mexico will finally acknowledge its Afro-Mexican population. “In 2015, for the first time ever, Mexico allowed its citizens to identify as an “Afro-Mexican” or “Afro-descendent” on its census. The results, more than 1.4 million people—around 1.2% of the population—said that they had African ancestry. Today, the majority of Afro-Mexicans reside in the states of Costa Chica, Guerrero, Oaxaca, and Veracruz—all places that were popular among escaped enslaved Africans.”

Where Black is Brown exhibition is designed to further the understanding of African influence and contributions in the Americas and to foster greater understanding among African Americans, Chicano/Latino, and Indigenous communities about their historical connections and their intermingled sangre (blood) that has produced beautiful and dynamic peoples of the Americas.

On the Thames last week, supporters of Britain’s departure from the European Union sprayed those who oppose it. Facundo Arrizabalaga/European Pressphoto Agency In Britain, polls indicate growing support for a vote to leave the European Union — in a so-called Brexit — but the murder of a member of Parliament who was a prominent opponent…

Style Africa 2016, held annually, is scheduled for the 24th and 25th of June 2016 at the Fashion Theater, California Market Center in Los Angeles, CA. The event is produced by Africa Boku Talent, Inc., a 501(c)3 organization whose mission is to showcase and support African Creativity in music, dance, film, stage, fashion, cuisine, art and more.

The last time Mexico took center stage in American politics was Sept. 6, 2001, when George W. Bush watched Mexican President Vicente Fox address a joint session of Congress in the nation’s capital.

Bush and Fox were friends, ranchers, businessmen, and came from the same rugged landscape that made their working together a done deal.

Both men were determined to take the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) to the next step by addressing the limitations and flaws in that agreement. The limitations were political (no free movement of people across borders) and economic (no single currency for the United States, Canada, and Mexico).